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Maker’s Monday: Live Streaming

We are officially settled in Colorado!

Unfortunately, I have not been able to set everything up yet. I was hoping for this post to be a studio tour, but maybe next week. This week I am happy to announce that I will be streaming 5 days a week on Twitch!

Tune in to watch me work Monday through Friday from Noon to 2 PM.

If you are one of our fans or followers from AZ, you will be an hour earlier since Colorado does participated in daylight savings time so it will be from 11 AM to 1 PM. I will probably stream longer than this on occasion, but I wanted to pick a time frame I can stick to for the time being. The schedule might change in the future.

Twitch is a really cool platform and I am excited to get rolling with it. I can stream live the sculpting that I am doing and there is also a chat room! Anyone watching can ask questions, say hi, philosophize about life, etc. It is a pretty seamless way to interact with supporters of our little company.

I have streamed on there a few times before, but it was very sporadic. I don’t have nearly the camera set up of nice overlays or anything that I would like, but that will come with time.

Which brings me to my piece of advice for this post:

If you want to do something then just DO IT!

Seriously …. No, shoosh …. No excuses ….. Do it.

I am on the wrong end of this advice A LOT, so I get it. I really do. However, I am going to be the nagging voice in your head like so many were for me. It doesn’t matter what equipment you have, what you think you need, that you might not look professional enough, have no idea what you are doing, etc. etc. etc.

Those are all excuses that we make for ourselves so we can remain in our comfort zone. Do you know where your comfort zone gets you? Nowhere. Also, if you think about it, the best way to learn to do something is to do it.

Say you want to stream (I’m very new to it myself), but you don’t have the fancy tripods and 3 camera setup that you have seen others have. You tell yourself that you cannot stream until you save the money to buy the fancy equipment. There are 3 problem scenarios here, all of which I have personally done.

You never save up money to buy the equipment so you never have it and you never start streaming.

You buy some fancy equipment and never use it. It just lays around because the problem was not actually the equipment, it was you getting in your own way.

You buy some fancy equipment and find out it doesn’t work for you for some reason. Your computer can’t handle it, it can’t be set up appropriately in your room space, you would prefer different equipment once you start using it, and so on. Now, you have sunk money into something that you probably wouldn’t have bought in the first place if you were already streaming when you bought it.

If you really think about it, almost everything you do that you are good at, you started doing it not knowing anything. When you started riding a bike as a kid, I doubt you immediately jumped on a motocross bike and started doing tricks. You started small. Maybe a plastic peddler or a tricycle. You also likely had Mom or Dad there to help mentor and teach you how to do it. You took baby steps.

So, why the heck as adults do we feel like if we cannot start at 60mph that it won’t work? WHY?

Start doing what you want to do with the minimum it takes to do it.

I am right now giving you permission to start something and be really really shitty at it.

Take ugly pictures. Make weird sculptures. Paint really bad paintings. Knit the most lopsided scarf ever. JUST DO IT.

The knowledge and experience you gain from doing something, and continuing to do it even when you think you suck at it, is completely priceless. You cannot buy experience. Someone can buy a fancy camera and take bad pictures while someone with a camera phone can take amazing photos.

You can always upgrade as you learn. I encourage that. Constantly get new tools, try new things, within your medium if you have one and without.

I am a sculptor/potter hybrid that prefers water based clay but I love painting along with Bob Ross.

Just because I have a medium, just because I have a ‘trade’, just because I have a business does not mean that I can’t enjoy other arts as well.

Also, I think starting is underrated. A lot of people talk the talk, but don’t walk the walk. Start walking. Even if you are a toddler that wobbles and falls down and maybe has to crawl through half of it, you are still a mile ahead of the guy who never started.